


A Story About You

by ThatCrazyCanadian



Category: Welcome to Night Vale
Genre: Gen
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2014-03-26
Updated: 2014-04-21
Packaged: 2018-01-17 03:41:50
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 2
Words: 1,930
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1372633
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ThatCrazyCanadian/pseuds/ThatCrazyCanadian
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>This is a story about you.</p>
<p>Yes, you.</p>
<p>(Takes place though Episodes 7 to 13)</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Welcome (History Week)

The day my life changed began outside of what was once my office. As I stood outside, a cold breeze rolled through, bringing with it a few small droplets of rain, and a promise of more to come. My job was, to but it lightly, boring. It involved writing direct mail campaigns for companies. "Finally, some good news in this dreary world!" I would write. "At last, a reason not to kill yourself!" Then, I would delete that, and write something else, which would be mailed out and read by absolutely no one. I closed the door to the building for what would be the last time, then walked out to my car. As I walked, my mind split open. Above me, I saw a planet of awesome size, lit by no sun. It was terrifying. I stood, slack-jawed outside my offic, even though the sky had opened up, and was now pouring water down over the city. Barely aware of my own actions, I ran to my car and started driving.

I drove late into the night, out of the cold, unforgiving city and into the equally cold, and perhaps more unforgiving, countryside. I was headed west on Interstate 70, and it wasn't long before I had the highway to myself. I stared ahead at the endless line of intermittent white stripes, and the passing exits. I was tired. So very tired. My head began to droop."Maybe if I could just... No! I have to stay awake," I thought to myself emptily. I drove on. In a fatigue-induced amnesia, I lost track of the time, where I was, the turns I had taken. As such, I had no reference for guessing how much time had passed when a purple exit sign reading, "Route 800 - Night Vale" appeared on the horizon. In the hopes of finding a hotel, and maybe a place to eat, I turned onto the exit, gliding smoothly off the interstate onto Route 800, which I had never heard of before. That should have been a warning to me. If not that, then the strange, unsettling feeling of unease that crept over me like a stranger in my home, uninvited, at night. But, my fatigue prevented me from noticing these fairly obvious signs. A few minutes later, I was gliding into the small, desert community of Night Vale. Off to my left, I could see the red, glowing sign of an Arby's, so I took the first left to head in that direction. As I drove north up 1st Street (as the road seemed to be called), the sense of foreboding that had lingered in the back of my mind since entering the town gradually increased. When I reached the corner of an ordinary looking, fenced-off park, it had grown to a screaming presence. An elegant plaque installed on the well-maintained metal fence read, " **DOG PARK** ". Inside, I could see figures. Hooded figures. I did not know what they were, but I could tell from the madness raging inside my head that they were not good. I slammed my foot down on the accelerator, and sped past the Dog Park.

I circled around the silent, darkened community. 15, maybe 20 minutes passed, and I was no closer to finding a place to stay than I had been when I arrived. Every business I passed was closed, shuttered and dark - except the Arby's. Even here in this small, unknown community, Arby's 24 hour service was a constant, and that thought comforted me. I swung back around to the restaurant, and parked in front. As soon as I set foot on the asphalt of the parking lot, lights illuminated the area. I looked up involuntarily, to see the source. There, above the glowing red of the Arby's sign, mysterious lights swirled overhead. I gaped, almost cowering in fear. I waited for any sign of their intentions. After a few minutes of their strange, indecipherable swirling, they faded out of sight. Shaken, I walked through the unlocked door of the Arby's, still glancing intermittently at the sky. Inside, the lights were on, but I couldn't see any employees. What I did notice, however, was a low moaning coming from behind the counter. Cautiously, terrified of what I might see, I leaned over the counter. On the floor, uniformed Arby's employees were wailing, curled up into the fetal position. I wasted no time getting out of there. Damn the hotel, I was sleeping in my car.

I was woken up the next morning by the crackling of my car's radio. Blinking in the glaring light, I glanced at my watch. 11:00. I sat up, turning the car on. Just as I put it in gear, a voice came over the radio:

_**It is almost complete. It is almost complete at last.** _

I blinked. The words were concerning, bordering on panic-inducing, but somehow they were... comforting.  

**_Welcome...to Night Vale._ **


	2. Chapter 2

**_As you well know, faithful listeners, it is Night Vale History Week, in which we all learn a bit about what made our bustling little town what it is. Or, as the official motto released by The City Council goes: “Poke about in the black recesses of the past until it devours our fragile present.”_ **

The voice continued to speak as I drove around the small town. It seemed like any other desert community, but I still felt like something was fundamentally wrong. I put it down to the strange sentences that continued to pour from the radio.

**_In the interest of civic participation, Night Vale Community Radio will be pitching in with short lessons about some points of interest from our town’s history, starting with: 4,000 B.C._ **

For such a small town, there seemed to be an inordinately large number of chain stores. Since I had never heard of this... “Night Vale”, I expected more family-owned companies. In a four-block area, I passed an Olive Garden, a Red Lobster, a Denny’s, a Wendy’s, an Applebee’s, an Old Navy, a Home Depot, a Subway, a Taco Bell, a Target, an Arby’s (of course), and a... National Guard Station and KFC Combo Store? I regarded the last of these with a keen interest, and contemplated investigating out of curiosity. Halfway up the drive, I noticed the heavily-armed guards and turned around.

**_The Night Vale Tourism Board asks that whoever is telepathically assaulting the tourists: please stop._ **

Still no hotels though.

I needed to leave.

I had a life outside of this town.

I couldn’t though.

I just couldn’t.

**_The city is asking residents for help in determining who, or what, is causing these psychological infractions. The Tourism Board is offering puppies as a reward for information on this case. Or, even if you don’t have information, the city asks that you come get a puppy or two anyway. Seriously, downtown municipal offices are overrun with them - in the trees, walls, carpentry. The exterminators are completely stymied by this infestation._ **

**_Please help._ **

At the corner of 1st and Oxford was a building. It looked like any other building, but it was also somehow... different. It wasn’t a visible difference. It was as if the building didn’t entirely exist here. It was here in Night Vale, but also somewhere else entirely different. The sign over the dark stone doors read, “Night Vale Community Radio Station”. Apparently this was where the strange broadcast originated from.

The year 1745: the first white men arrive in Night Vale, which was not Night Vale then but was rather just another part of a large and featureless desert. I think we can all agree, though, that even as large and featureless as the desert was, the part that would eventually become Desert Bluffs was still probably awful and drab in comparison to our part.

Continuing northward, 1st gave way to a well-maintained gravel driveway. At the end was a trailer park. This was probably the most normal thing I had seen all day. People were walking around the park, which seemed to be full of life and activity. Except one trailer. I parked my car and got out. There was a sign on the trailer’s door with two words printed on it in a large bold font.

The words were my name.

**_And now, traffic._ **

I stared at the door in disbelief. No one here knew me; I had just arrived. Clearly, this was someone else’s trailer. I mean, how could it be mine? I had never even heard of this town, much less visited it before. Curiosity still got the best of me. Grabbing the handle, I discovered that the door was unlocked. Cautiously pushing it in, I poked my head in. If the sign had surprised me, the interior of the trailer surprised me even more. It was decorated much like my apartment back home. As I looked around, I realized that the trailer’s contents didn’t just look like those I had left back home, they were those that I thought I left back home. I couldn’t believe what I was seeing. If I hadn’t known where I was going when I left, there was no way that anyone else could have packed up my entire apartment and moved it here in the time that I had been gone. And yet, here it all was, down to the smallest detail: the trophy I won at the 4th grade science fair, dented from when I dropped it in excitement; the poster hanging over my bed, missing the upper left corner from when it was accidentally ripped off the wall in 11th grade. Everything. As I wandered, the radio (seriously, what is with these people and their radios?) continued to burble in the corner:

_**Night Vale High won the grudge match against the Desert Bluffs Vultures last night. Two headed quarterback Michael Sandero credits the win to help from Angels! The Angels have made an adamant denial of any involvement whatsoever in the game. The school district ethics committee has announced that they will look into any possible “Angelic interference”.** _

I sat down on the bed in shock. Even that didn’t help: the bed felt exactly the same as the one I had spent years sleeping on in my apartment. Standing up didn’t help either: it only helped me realized that somehow, my entire apartment, which had been a reasonable size, somehow fit inside this tiny trailer. Nothing in this town made sense. I no longer understood anything. Even the simplest of things, like Arby’s, had become strange and mysterious to me. It was terrifying, but... exhilerating.

_**And now, the weather!** _

The radio was playing music when I climbed back into my car. When I drove around town this time, I no longer felt scared. I felt confident. More confident than ever before in my life. This town - Night Vale - was strange and unknown. In a way, this gave me a chance to change my life. To reinvent myself in a town where no one knew who I was. To get away from my boring job, writing direct mail campaigns for companies. This was my good news in a dreary world.

**_But most importantly, all of us — all of us here in Night Vale, in America, in the world, in the secret orbital bases — all of us got through another day. We passed the time from one end of twelve to the other without stopping once._ **   
  
**_Well done, us! Good job, people who experience time! Time experiencers! Good job!_ **   
  
**_And, from this moment in history, the one that’s happening right now…_ **   
  
**_Good night, Night Vale. Goodnight._ **

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> While writing this, I realized it should probably be in second person. Oh well.

**Author's Note:**

> Yeah, I know. I can't write.


End file.
